Life Lessons
by The Genius Mage
Summary: Roxas and Namine often teach each other things, but they're sometimes unaware of it. Oh well, they'll have fun doing it! Connected to "Life's Little Moments" and "One Step at a Time", but I'm too lazy to add them to this oneshot collection.
1. Think Twice

Think Twice

_~*He never seemed to, and this puzzled her.*~_

The first thing Namine noticed about Roxas was he could be _determined._

If he decided to do something, you better help or get the _hell_ out of the way.

Right now, for example, he was intent on finishing his Algebra homework. He was scribbling frantically, eyes narrowed, carrying numbers and dividing and adding…

Namine watched from over her boyfriend's shoulder, watching as he added too quickly and missed a number, and ended up with the wrong answer.

However, he was too intent on finishing to notice, and he zoomed right on ahead. She placed her hand on his, guiding his hand back to circle the wrong numbers.

"Do you double check your work?" She asked him, amused. He smiled sheepishly.

"Of course, I was going to finish this first."

He got to work again immediately, getting more than half the problems wrong due to his haste, and she watched with an amused expression on her face as he plowed straight on.

Roxas paused to glance up at her, probably wondering what she was looking at, then looked down and began working harder, dragging his pencil across the paper, scratching loudly.

"Do you need help?"

"Nope." He replied cheerily. He dropped his pencil, looking smug. "Done."

She leaned over, made a face, and started crossing out the wrong answers. The ceiling fan cast around dancing shadows on the walls in his room as she reworked the problems he got wrong, sighing.

"Roxas, Life Lesson number three." She chided him gently.

"Huh?" He said intelligently.

"Think twice! Double check!" Namine handed him back his pencil. "If something looks right the first time, check it again for good measure."

"What if it looks wrong then?"

"Check again and again until it comes up right." She replied with a smile, and he let her help with his math homework.

He wrapped his arms around her shoulders, smirking gently. "Is there a calculator in your brain or something?"

"Possibly. It's the amazing world of studying."

"I had no idea." Roxas replied, just the faintest tinge of sarcasm in his tone.

~***~

The trains screeched into the station, and Namine nervously bit her nails, staring at Hayner who was skateboarding with Roxas near the tracks.

"Oh my God! Guys!"

Olette looked just as worried, and Pence was just staring awestruck.

"Don't go near the tracks! Eek!" Olette panicked. "Please, for real, Hayner, Roxas!"

"Stop being dumb!" Pence shouted.

The duo just grinned, grinding on the tracks not being used, and Roxas flipped on his board.

"Think twice! Remember!?" Namine shouted.

Her boyfriend paused, skating back to her just as Hayner fell and hit his head.

"Oh! Hayner!" Olette ran forward, but he was already sitting up, rubbing his skull.

"Do you ever know what think twice means?" Namine hissed at him as he rolled to a stop.

"Think again?" he guessed.

"It means consider, and then reconsider! Look at everything from every angle! You probably thought the rails would make good practice for your board, but you forgot…" Namine pointed to the trains, then jabbed her finger into his chest, furious for the danger he put himself in. "These tracks are still in use, even if some of the trains aren't here yet! Consider how you could have gotten run over!"

Roxas nodded. "Okay, I get it. I'll think twice. You're getting good at this life lessons thing." He smiled that grin that melted her heart, and she relaxed, knowing the message had gotten home.

Namine watched the sunset bleed red light across the station, casting everything in deep scarlet, generating long shadows.

"That's because you need some serious help, Roxas." She sighed, but her tone was affectionate.

He kissed her quickly, grinning at her blush.

"Good thing you're here then, I really _do_ need help. But I'm a teenager in the summer, this is normal." He rubbed his hair nervously, and then added, "We'll have to help Hayner more than me, though."

Hayner had dropped back again and Pence approached the duo with a sigh.

"We'll need to lend a hand; he went and got a bruise, I I hope it's just that."

"We're on it." They both said at the same time.

As they walked, Namine said under her breath, "Don't freak me out like that!"

~***~

_**I should just make all of these Roxas and Namine things into a one shot collection.**_

_**Yup. Maybe. Next one of these is going to have Roxas with a "Life Lesson" for Namine.**_

_**Review? **_


	2. Don't Worry

Don't Worry

_~*He was used to getting a lesson, but _he_ giving one to _her_?*~_

Roxas noticed something.

He really did. He rarely missed anything when it came to her, but she had a way of hiding it that caused him to occasionally overlook a thing or two.

If he overlooked it, it was usually a very important issue that she felt she had to hide from him.

She was…_stressed out._ Roxas leaned forward on his elbows, looking at her from over the side of his bed. She was sketching a picture that was lacking its usual detail, it looked hurried and untidy. Her shoulders were rigid, her breathing was a little too fast, and she was frowning slightly, it tugged at the corner of her mouth.

"Something the matter?" He asked gently.

The pencil paused, and Namine shook her head. "Nothing. Why?"

He pointed to the picture, and then gestured to his walls, which had some of her other sketches on it. "You usually have more…um…" He fumbled for the right word. "Detail in it."

"It's a rough draft." She snapped.

He blinked in surprise, leaning over and resting his chin, lightly, on her head. "Gonna tell me what's wrong, or do I have to wait?"

When she didn't reply straight away, he just closed his eyes and waited for her to say something.

Roxas cared about Namine, he really did, but when she got all reclusive on him he had no idea what to do.

So he did nothing. He just waited.

He let her eyes wander to her pencil, which was pressing into the paper, leaving deep, sharp, marks. Roxas sighed, and the instant he did, he felt Namine shake. Lifting his head, he shifted to look at her better, gasping when she started crying.

"N-Namine?" He asked, feeling helpless as she buried her face in her arms and cried. He jumped off his bed, kneeling beside her. "What's the matter? Please, don't cry."

Namine paused, looking at him briefly before taking in a deep breath.

"Sorry…" She said so quietly he barely heard.

"What's wrong?" He couldn't hide the anxiousness in his voice.

"My…parents are fighting."

He blinked. "Sorry?"

"My parents are fighting!"

"Parents fight sometimes." Roxas replied uncomfortably, trying not to think about his own divorced parents. He gently intertwined his fingers with hers, and she sniffled slightly.

"M-Mine hasn't. They don't, usually, and now they're doing it almost daily." She said, her voice sounding small and weak. She curled up against his side, and he looked sympathetically at her, not knowing it bothered her so much. He wished he had the right thing to say, but his mind was short circuiting.

"Why?"

"…Me. It's my fault, Roxas." Namine sounded miserable. "We're a little tight on money lately, and…he's…my dad thinks it's my fault, buying my art supplies and having to support a kid who goes to school with new equipment and-"

"Hold on. This isn't your fault at all." He assured her, rubbing her shoulders in a soothing way. "How long have they done this?"

"A week or so…"

"Give them some time to work it out; everyone hits a rough spot in their relationship."

"…But what if-"

Exasperated, Roxas gently tilted her head to look at him, and he pronounced each word slowly.

"Enough, okay? Don't worry about it! Don't think about every 'what if' that life can throw at you! I could say, 'What if a fire happened right now, and we all die?', and then I'd be worrying for nothing! That's what you're doing!" He smiled. "If you want to imagine every 'what if' that life can fling at you, you'll spend your existence worrying about more made up problems than real ones! Relax." He released her and lay down on his stomach next to her. "Don't freak out so much. Look at what you can change, but don't try and alter everything you can't."

Namine was silent for so long he thought she had fallen asleep, because her eyes had closed, but now she spoke.

"Life lesson number four." Her tone was laced with amusement.

"Huh?"

"Hee hee…thanks, Roxas." She leaned over and kissed his cheek, and then she gathered her supplies and told him she had to go.

When she had left, he sat up, scratching his head.

"Didn't know I had it in me."

~***~

_**These stories will probably be updated on the weekend…at least once a week, because I DO have other things I work on.**_

_**Thanks for the reviews so far, you people rock. For real.**_


	3. Seeing The Humor

Seeing the Humor

_~*Seeing the humor in something makes a chore interesting.*~_

"_Now_ what are you doing?"

Namine blinked, her boyfriend's angel tones interrupting her work, and she gave him an annoyed look. "I'm drawing, Roxas." She looked back up at the apple she was trying to capture on paper, and Roxas sat down beside her. He must have just come over at some point, walking straight in her house, without knocking.

_We need to fix that lock._ She made a mental note to herself.

He yawned, crossing his arms behind his head, just watching her.

Namine gave him another look that said, _quiet while I work,_ and then she started sketching once more. She smoothly dragged the pencil across the paper, making curves and adding shading to the apple as it slowly appeared on the white sketchpad. She started to make its shadow, its texture, and added little imperfections that added to its completeness in a strange way.

She heard a sound then, and she paused, the pencil frozen in the act of creating the apple's stem. "Hungry?"

Roxas looked guiltily at her. "Just a little, I didn't eat before I left."

She shook her head, but smiled at him all the same. "Go ahead and get something to eat." She gestured to her kitchen.

"You sure?"

Namine went back to sketching. "Positive."

Roxas got up and left. She continued to draw as she listened to the clatter of doors opening as he scrounged for something to eat. The dark, wood walls of her house seemed to reflect the lamplight, giving everything a warm feel.

She looked up again as Roxas called, "Namine?"

"Hmm?"

He poked his head around the corner, perfectly messy blonde hair silhouetted against the kitchen light. "Do you want anything while I have this ice cream scoop out?" He gave her a silly grin.

Namine looked at him, and then broke into laughter, leaning back into her seat. "You're so _foolish_, Roxas! Is this your way of asking if you can have some ice cream?"

"No," he said innocently. "You're the one implying it. But does that mean I can?" He added hopefully.

She giggled, picking up her pencil again. "Yes, Roxas. You can. Get me some too, please."

He grinned hugely before vanishing back into the kitchen, and she hummed in amusement. Whenever she got too far into working, she could count on him to bring her back to the real world, where laughter exists if you stop to look for it.

~***~

Sometimes it wasn't just Namine that overworked herself, Roxas did it without realizing it.

He was covered in white splotches as he painted the fence of his house, eyes narrowed in concentration as he worked.

"Roxas," Hayner called. "Want to hang out today?"

"I don't know if you've noticed the loop around fence I'm working on." He grumbled in response, jabbing the brush in rather violently and spilling some of the sluggish liquid on the grass.

Namine was with Hayner, and went over to Roxas, noticing the poor grass dyed white by the dripping paint. She bent down, picked up a spare brush, and wordlessly began helping him.

Not long after, Hayner caught on, and got Pence and Olette. The friends began helping him paint, using some old paintbrushes from a shed in the yard.

While they worked, they talked and joked, occasionally flicking paint and at each and giggling. The more his friends hung out with him, the more that annoyed, scowling look faded from his face and his blue eyes resumed their usual bright blue laughter.

"What was the matter?" Namine asked him quietly as Hayner fled from Olette, whom he had just doused with a streak of white paint.

"Ah, nothing. I didn't want to have to paint today, because I wanted to hang out with you." He painted a smooth stroke across the wood, which was almost complete. He paused as Pence ran by, trying to stop Olette from getting paint in Hayner's hair. "I didn't want to have to ruin your day by asking, so I was just sorta mad because…weren't we going to the beach today?"

"I see." Namine laughed. "The beach isn't going anywhere. Don't worry. Because…" She raised her voice. "We're going to help you finish the fence!"

The others stopped what they were doing, staring dumbly at her, before breaking into apologies and scrambling back to the fence.

"We've got to see the humor in everything, because usually there's something stupid going on in the background." Namine said with a giggle.

Roxas rolled his eyes but smiled. "That's true, we have _three_ 'something stupids', but we've got a bigger problem now."

She raised her eyebrows, and Roxas gestured to the yard.

"What do we do about all of this white grass?"

~***~

_**Sorry about the late update, I've got a cold…in the summer. What the heck?**_

_**Review!**_


End file.
